Motherhood leaves Egnot all at sea

By Suzanne McFadden

Leslie Egnot - America's Cup helmswoman, businesswoman and new mother - feels lost at sea. She can't remember how to sail.

The woman who helmed the first all-female America's Cup boat in 1995 is struggling to collect her wits for the 1999-2000 Cup.

The charming Egnot, who has an eight-month-old son, has not made the sailing team for the America True syndicate in next week's Road to the America's Cup - because she didn't make the grade.

Her problem?

"I've lost too many brain cells," she said. "I just feel like such an idiot out on the water. They say your brain totally goes when you have a baby, and now I can totally relate to it. I can't wait to get my brain back - I just don't know how long it takes."

Aucklander Egnot has travelled a difficult road since her star role in the last Cup campaign in San Diego.

She suffered a neck injury in a fall at the helm of Cup boat Mighty Mary, which left her in constant pain for three years and eventually required surgery. She was in agony throughout her 1996 Olympic campaign, and then retired from sailing.

Her skipper from 1995, Dawn Riley, convinced her to make a comeback in the afterguard of the co-ed America True challenge (Egnot can sail for the Americans because she was born in the United States).

Then she became pregnant with Nicholas. It was a difficult pregnancy where she was confined to bed for 12 weeks.

But when the True team set up base in Auckland just before Christmas, Egnot returned to work.

"It's been so hard - being a mother and a sailor. My life is so torn right now between Nicholas and the America's Cup," she said.

"Nick has been sick a lot with croup so Dave [Egnot's husband] and I have been up all through the night, and then you worry about him all day."

She also has a sailing accessories business to run: "I try to do that at night after I put Nick to bed."

Egnot found it tough taking the news that she won't be in the sailing 16 on board America True in the final dress rehearsal for the Cup starting next Tuesday.

"But I totally understand - I know I'm not doing a good job," she said. "I'm so rusty. I haven't matchraced since the last America's Cup. I wish it came back as easy as riding a bike. But I guess if it was that easy it wouldn't be the America's Cup."

Egnot will still be on the water every day next week as an adviser to the True team. And her chance to sail may still come up.

"I am just so thrilled that they're giving me a chance. I know I'm so lucky. They've waited and waited for me - first with my neck injury and then having a baby.

"They are so understanding. On windy days when we can't sail, I can come home, while the rest of the crew are obliged to stay and work on the boat."

Egnot wants to stick with it. She plans to do more matchracing through the winter here in Auckland. And she wants to brush up on the skills for her new job - navigating and calling tactics in the brains trust of the boat with fellow Kiwis Kelvin Harrap and John Cutler.

"I'm finding it a real challenge because I'm not used to being a navigator or a tactician. I've only ever driven boats. But I've already learned heaps."
Egnot won't be expected to join the team in the United States before they return to Auckland for the challenger series starting in October.

She will be more content staying at home with her husband and son on their serene 1ha property at Coatesville, north of Auckland.

"Dave has been brilliant support through all of this. He's the one who's been encouraging me to do it."

She will continue to strengthen her neck, which has been put to the test back on a boat.

"I still have to nurse it. I don't go to the gym every morning with the rest of the team, because I know I'd try to push myself to keep up with them and overcook it."

Instead she goes bike riding with Rosie the family border collie every morning, swims and works out on her rowing machine.

"So far my neck is hanging in there. The best thing that happened was when Nicholas tried to arrive 25 weeks into the pregnancy. The forced bed rest was the best healing I'd ever had."

Pictured: Leslie Egnot with her son Nicholas and miniature horse Cocoa. PICTURE / JOHN SEFTON